Warning: This article includes screenshots of chat room conversations and visual elements of an antisemitic and racist nature.
White Lives Matter (WLM) is a neo-Nazi initiative that over the past year has spread to a number of areas in the US and Canada, as well as to New Zealand, Australia, the Netherlands, and elsewhere in the world. The network’s first documented action was a series of decentralized demonstrations on May 8, 2021. The low turnout for these events led some observers to conclude that the undertaking had failed, but that optimistic assessment proved premature, as the network continued to grow, with an increasing number of actions over the past year.
WLM signals an attempt to reconsolidate the neo-Nazi milieu via decentralized chat rooms on the Telegram app. This approach is in part an effort to circumvent various obstacles, ranging from censorship on the major social media platforms to doxxing and other forms of resistance from the antifascist movement, as well as eventual criminal prosecution. It also parallels the international tendency amongst neo-Nazis towards clandestine, decentralized, and “leaderless” forms of activism, a trend with roots stretching back to the 1970s. Over the years, this has given rise to the “accelerationist” current and the increased prevalence of “lone wolf” mass murderers.
The WLM project also reflects substantial frustration with the marginal status of the neo-Nazi far right and a desire to move beyond the current subculture and the ideological quarrels among different tendencies and to form an activist network able to exercise genuine influence.
Although WLM is beyond any shadow of a doubt a neo-Nazi phenomenon, the American organizers’ original intent was to soften the movement’s image, which concretely translated into a superficial reticence to openly identify with the Nazi legacy or to use the swastika or other Nazi symbols in public discussions or on the stickers that the movement’s activists put up in public. Participants were also instructed (an instruction they often ignored) not to discuss the “Jewish question” or to encourage violence on public channels. Despite this, the chat rooms are completely saturated with Hitler memes, explicit references to historical Nazism, and unbridled racism of the most extreme variety—jokes about lynching Blacks, Holocaust denial videos, discussions asserting that Jews are not human and must be exterminated, etc.
The world as imagined by members of the White Lives Matter
WLM is not a formal organization; each local group has its own Telegram channel moderated by its own admin or admins. Nonetheless, it is a well-coordinated project, many of the channels having been created in 2021 by a small original group, which then sought out activists in each region to act as admins. Propaganda promotes shared methods and goals, and dates for actions and decisions regarding “messaging” appear to be centralized.
Telegram channels can be strictly unidirectional (like an email newsletter, with the content entirely determined by the admin), or they can take the form of an open chat, somewhat in the style of a public Facebook group. In many cases, the unidirectional channels include a parallel chat room – this is the basic structure of the WLM regional groups. Once these virtual spaces were established, the participants were encouraged to print WLM posters and stickers (typically, different variations on the central racist theme of the “great replacement” and the oppression of whites at the hands of other groups), to coordinate outreach and propaganda campaigns, and to take photos of their actions and post them on Telegram to encourage other people to also get involved.
Some WLM outings have received coverage in the Canadian media (e.g., posters in Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario and New Battleford, Saskatchewan; in Toronto, where they have joined demonstrations against public health measures; see also the recent report on WLM activities in Montreal in Pivot), but mostly they have gone unnoticed. In some cases, local groups have met in person to coordinate more ambitious actions, e.g., banner drops in public areas.
This structure and approach is not unique to WLM; it is also shared by various other groups on the far right at the present time. Telegram provides a platform that allows individuals to get involved according to their own comfort level, and to become integrated into a community of sorts, with no need to meet or talk to anyone in person, all the while being encouraged to develop activities suited to their own capabilities.
As of this writing, many WLM channels are to all intents and purposes dormant, with less than a dozen members. Meanwhile, some groups in the US have taken their activities off the internet and into the streets in the form of banner drops, organized outings, leafletting, etc. In the areas where it is most active, WLM has been entwined with other neo-Nazi groups, such as the Folkish Resistance Movement (whose propaganda has been distributed in Saskatchewan and Alberta),[1] the Canada First group in Ontario, which received a certain amount of visibility at the so-called “Freedom Convoy” in Ottawa, and the attempt to set up a group called “Nationalist 13” (“13” symbolizing “anti-communist”) in southern Ontario.
Examining the WLM’s internal chat logs, obtained from comrades with Cornvallis Antifa, it appears that in Canada the user known as “McLeafin” was brought on board by the US organizers in April 2021. He then set up a number of channels for different provinces and proceeded to seek out recruits to act as admins.
The following call to action originally appeared in Russian on avtonom.org, the platform that emerged from the Russia-wide anarchist network Autonomous Action.
Our Russian colleagues report that, under a new law introduced this week, those who are found guilty of spreading misinformation about the invasion of Ukraine can be sentenced to years in prison. This apparently includes those who simply refer to the invasion as a “war,” rather than a “special operation,” as Putin’s government has insisted on doing. In this context, demonstrators show tremendous courage taking to the streets.
The next mass day of protest is scheduled for this Sunday, March 6. We hope their efforts will be echoed by demonstrators around the world, placing pressure from all directions on the Russian government, the global capitalist class, military profiteers, and all the other forces that are abetting the invasion.
To support political prisoners in Russia, donate to the Anarchist Black Cross in Moscow here. To support anarchists in Ukraine, donate here or here. There is also a solidarity structure to support refugees fleeing from Ukraine.
The chief supporters of the prevailing order in Russia today.Anti-war demonstrators in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Spring Is Coming: Take to the Streets against the War
The Russian army has invaded Ukraine. Putin has lost his senses and his army is bombing cities, shooting civilians, and killing children. More than one million people have fled the country in order to escape from Putin’s “liberators.”
We refuse to submit to Russian military censorship. We say openly and clearly: this is war. This is a war of conquest and the Russian army is running it. With weapons in their hands, Ukrainians are successfully defending themselves from the invaders, but we, who are inside Russia, cannot stand aside from these events. We must show each other and the world that we are against this war, that only Putin and his gang need it. To be against the war is genuine anti-fascism right now.
March 6, this coming Sunday, is the general day of anti-war actions in Russia. Take the central square of your city! One of the meeting points in Moscow is the Square of the train stations at 15:00. There are also meetings at 19:00 and other times. Decide and organize for yourselves, team up with your friends. The main thing is to get out on the streets.
The Russian authorities are panicking now. They have realized that they are losing this war. That is why they hysterically threaten anti-war protesters—with expulsion, or with dismissal, or with immediate conscription into the army, or with jail. Don’t be afraid of them. Ukrainians in their cities go out into the streets with bare hands to protest against the invaders. They are standing against solders with riffles, against tanks. How can one be afraid of the rusty machinery of the Russian police?
We demand an immediate end to the war. We demand the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine. This is the main condition for any further action: the aggression of the Russian Federation must stop. We must stop the slaughter of people. Yes, Putin didn’t ask us when he planned the invasion—but we didn’t stop him in time. So it is important to do it at least now.
Of course, our main goal now is to stop the war in Ukraine. But we have to fight for the future of Russia, as well. There isn’t much time left for this deranged dictator. His small victorious war didn’t go according to the plan and now his removal is only a matter of time and concrete means. But what happens next, after Putin?
The lands of the “Russian Federation” are now at a historical crossroads. The collapse of Putin’s regime may trigger the process of liberation. Sure, they won’t lead to anarchist ideals immediately—but at least Russia will no longer be at war with the rest of the world and with its own population. In this wave of changes, there will be opportunities for serious changes in the political system towards greater decentralization—for example, the complete abolition of the presidency and the transition to a parliamentary republic, which we have been talking about for a long time.
However, there’s another possibility for “what comes next” after Putin: the regime transforming into a pupal stage, into an even more authoritarian regime—the complete closure of all borders and the cessation of international contacts. Blocking half of the Internet in Russia tonight is only the first sign. There will no longer be any forces left for aggressive wars, but this will not make it easier for the inhabitants: they will find themselves in a state reminiscent of North Korea. And there is absolutely no anarchist movement in North Korea. None.
The face of the future of Russia as well as the present? It remains to be seen.
Now, in the coming days and weeks, we all have a unique window of opportunity. Putin’s authoritarian regime has made a fatal mistake and is reeling. If the psychopath in the Kremlin does not press the nuclear button, he will not live long. And now everything depends on us, the inhabitants of Russia. If we remain silent, then the agenda will quickly be hijacked by isolationists and conservatives, who are in the majority in the upper levels of power. But if we are active, we will win. A rusted leviathan needs only to be pushed and it will crumble into dust.
Take the streets on March 6. If you can’t go out on March 6, go out on other days. If you can’t go out at all, protest against the war in other ways: distribute leaflets and posters, stick up stickers, write “no war” on medical masks, hang posters from balconies. Finally, talk to people. This is now more important than studies, more important than work, more important than anything else in the world. Now the fate of not only Ukraine, but also Russia is being decided. Our future is being determined—and only we will be responsible for what it will be.
A sticker reading “No War” in St. Petersburg, Russia.A sticker reading “No War” on an urban map in St. Petersburg, Russia.A sign affixed to a backpack via charming pins, belonging to a Russian anti-war protester.
Sex Workers Demand Full Decriminalization of their Work
Sex workers cannot be ignored anymore. In unceded territories that we call Canada, like elsewhere around the world, they continue to be targeted by harmful policies that criminalize sex work and sex workers, under the guise of saving them from human trafficking and sexual exploitation. Far from reaching their goals of eradicating the sex industry, these policies instead marginalize and isolate sex workers from social and legal services, and increase their vulnerability to violence. In response to this repression, sex workers organize to demand better working conditions and equally, worker status with the rights and social protections that comes with that. We argue that it isn’t the nature of the work itself (the exchange of sexual services for money) that exposes sex workers to violence, but rather the repressive laws that govern it.
The implementation of the Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act (PCEPA) in 2014 made sex work illegal for the first time in Canada. The PCEPA prohibits communicating for the sale of sex in a public space; prohibits advertising the sexual services of another person; prohibits profiting materially from sex work; and criminalizes the purchase of sexual services in any and all contexts. This legislative regime, advocated by many anti-prostitution feminist groups, claims to eliminate demand by criminalizing clients and third parties in order to abolish the sex industry. In fact, since its passage, this law has made sex workers more precarious and vulnerable to violence. By representing sex workers as victims, these laws normalize rather than combat violence against them.
Indeed, these laws create unsafe and exploitative work environments and maintain substandard working conditions. These conditions are the source of sex workers’ daily worries, ranging from difficulties in getting paid to the impossibility of denouncing violence by clients, employers and law enforcement through legal procedures. For those who work independently, criminalization remains an issue, as clients are less likely to provide important security information such as their real identity. This makes it difficult for sex workers to create and maintain important safety mechanism at work, and has led to the murder of several sex workers. For those who work on the street, the prohibition on communicating for the sale of sexual services in public spaces (near parks, schools and daycares) means that they end up working in secluded, poorly lit areas – out of reach of being witnessed – putting them at greater risk of violence. Immigration laws in addition to criminal provisions around sex work encourage more surveillance of migrant sex workers in the industry, and as a result, they may face loss of status, detention, and deportation if their work is discovered – even if they work in legal sectors of the industry such as licensed massage parlors and strip clubs.
Decriminalization was implemented in New Zealand 20 years ago, and as a result, sex workers are able to put safety mechanisms into place for their work and seek recourse when they experience violence on the job. This government has just started to initiate its mandated task of studying the impacts of PCEPA, even though it should’ve been done five years after its implementation. Time is running out, as sex workers continue to suffer the impacts of criminalization!
We need to repeal the Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act and decriminalization of sex work now!
This letter was signed by 68 individuals and 50 organizations, all over the unceded indigenous territories that we call Canada, in different sectors: unions, academic, arts, harm reduction, STI prevention, women, migrant, indigenous and trans rights.
Organizations:
Tables des organismes montréalais de lutte contre le sida (TOMS)
Stella, l’amie de Maimie
Sex Professionals of Canada (SPOC)
Sex Workers of Winnipeg Action Coalition (SWWAC)
Answer Society
HIV Legal Network
Peers Victoria Resources Society
Projet LUNE
Solidarité Sans Frontière
Après l’Asphalte
Tout.e ou pantoute podcast
Closet space Winnipeg
Defund the police
Plein Milieu
Centre Associatif Polyvalent d’Aide hépatite C (CAPAHC)
Chapitre Montréalais des Socialiste Démocratiques du Canada
Projet Intervention Prostitution Québec (PIPQ)
Fondation Filles d’Action
AlterHéros
2fxflematin
Syndicat des travailleuses et travailleurs en intervention communautaire (STTIC-CSN)
Aide aux trans du Québec (ATQ)
No Borders Media
Queer McGill
Midnight Kitchen
Collectif Un Salaire Pour Toustes les Stagiaires (SPTS)
Collectif Opposé à la Brutalité Policière (COBP)
REZO -santé et mieux-être des hommes gais et bisexuels, cis et trans
BRUE
PIAMP
Pivot Legal Society
Réseau d’aide aux personnes seules et itinérantes de Montréal (RAPSIM)
Sphère – Santé sexuelle globale
Dopamine
AIDS Community Care Montreal (ACCM)
Defund Network 604
Projet de Travailleurs de Soutien aux Autochtones (PTSA)/Indigenous Support Workers Project (ISWP)
Indigenous Sex Work and Art Collective (ISWAC)
Game Workers Unite Montréal
Rue Action prévention (RAP Jeunesse)
Sex Worker Aotearoa Network
Maggie’s Toronto Sex Workers Action Project
PIECE Edmonton
Moms stop the harm
Collectif NU.E.S
Centre for Gender & Sexual Health Equity
AGIR: Action LGBTQ+ avec les immigrant.es et les réfugié.es
As the Russian invasion of Ukraine proceeds, anarchists throughout Russia continue to mobilize in protest, joining thousands of other Russians. Here, we publish two statements from longtime Russian anarchist projects that offer some analysis of the situation in Russia and how the invasion of Ukraine might shift it.
Protests are scheduled in Russia for tomorrow (Sunday, February 27). We are still waiting for a report from our contacts in Ukraine, which we will publish when it arrives.
Russia itself has become an information battlefield in the course of the invasion. The Russian government has attempted to block access to Twitter so that Russians will not see what is happening in Ukraine or, for that matter, elsewhere in Russia. On the other side of the barricades, the Kremlin website was hacked. Whether the Russian people decide to support this invasion at great cost to themselves—or to oppose Putin’s agenda at great risk to themselves—may well determine what happens in Ukraine in the long run.
“Peace is a privilege reserved for those who can afford not to fight in the wars they create—in the eyes of madmen, we are just figures on a chart, we are just barriers in their path towards world domination.”
Solidarity actions continued today in Germany, Switzerland, and elsewhere around the world.
Anarchist Militant’s Position on Russia’s Attack on Ukraine
The following statement appeared yesterday on the Telegram channel of Militant Anarchist [Боец Анархист], a collective in Russia whose name we have previously translated as “Anarchist Fighter.”
Our position on the events taking place in Ukraine is clearly evident in our previous posts. However, we felt it necessary to express it explicitly, so that something would not be left unsaid.
We, the collective of Anarchist Fighter, are by no means fans of the Ukrainian state. We have repeatedly criticized it and supported opposition to it in the past, and we have also been the cause of large-scale repression against the VirtualSim operator, done by the Ukrainian security services in an attempt to fight us.1
And we will definitely return to this policy in the future, when the threat of Russian conquest has receded. All states are concentration camps.
But what is happening now in Ukraine goes beyond this simple formula, and the principle that every anarchist should fight for the defeat of their country in war.
Because this is not simply a war between two roughly equal powers over the redistribution of capital’s spheres of influence, in which one could apply Eskobar’s axiom.2
What is happening in Ukraine now is an act of imperialist aggression: an aggression that, if successful, will lead to a decline in freedom everywhere—in Ukraine, in Russia, and possibly in other countries as well. And it will also increase the likelihood that the war will continue and escalate into a global war.
Why this is the case in Ukraine is obvious, as far as we are concerned. But in Russia, a small victorious war (as well as external sanctions) will give the regime what it currently lacks. It will give them carte blanche for any action, due to the patriotic upsurge that will take place among part of the population. And they will be able to blame any economic problems on sanctions and war.
The defeat of Russia, in the current situation, will increase the likelihood of people waking up, the same way that occurred in 1905 [when Russia’s military defeat by Japan led to an uprising in Russia], or in 1917 [when Russia’s problems in the First World War led to the Russian Revolution]—opening their eyes to what is happening in the country.
As for Ukraine, its victory will also pave the way for the strengthening of grassroots democracy—after all, if it is achieved, it will be only through popular self-organization, mutual assistance, and collective resistance. These should be the answer to the challenges that war throws at society.
Furthermore, the structures created for this grassroots self-organization will not go anywhere once the war is over.
Of course, victory will not solve the problems of Ukrainian society—they will have to be solved by taking advantage of the opportunities that will open for the consolidation of society in the instability of the regime that comes after such upheavals. However, defeat will not only fail to solve them—it will exacerbate them many times over.
Though all these are all important reasons for our decision to support Ukraine in this conflict—let’s call them geopolitical reasons. But they are not even the primary reasons. The most important reasons are internal moral ones: because the simple truth is that Russia is the aggressor, that it pursues an openly fascist policy. It calls war peace. Russia lies and kills.
Because of its aggressive actions, people are dying and suffering on both sides of the conflict. Yes, even those soldiers who are now being driven into the meat grinder of war (not counting those bastards for whom “war is mother nature,” who, in our opinion, are hardly people at all). And this will continue until it is stopped.
Therefore, we urge everyone who reads this, who is not unfeeling—to show solidarity with the Ukrainian people (not the state!!!) and support their struggle for freedom against Putin’s tyranny.
It falls to us to live in historic times. Let’s make this page of history not a shameful one, but one we can be proud of.
Freedom to the peoples of the world! Peace to the people of Ukraine! No to Putin’s aggression! No to war!
Anti-war protesters march with a banner in Moscow. Anarchists marched repeatedly with this banner on the night of February 24. According to reports, even after police dispersed the main demonstration, making many arrests, anarchists regrouped and marched again until the police charged and arrested them. The courage that protesters have shown in Russia is humbling.
On Thursday morning, Putin launched the biggest war in Europe since World War II. He hides behind the alleged interests of the separatist part of Donbas. Although the DPR and LPR were absolutely satisfied with the recognition of their statehood, the official entry of the Russian army and the promised one and a half trillion rubles. Recall that for many months, the cost of rent and food prices in Russia itself have been growing day by day.
The Kremlin has made absurd demands of the Kiev authorities—let’s start with “denazification.” It is true that, thanks to their active participation in the Maidan protests of 2014, the Ukrainian ultra-right has secured an outsize position in politics and law enforcement agencies. But in all the elections in Ukraine since 2014, they have won no more than a few percent points of the vote. The President of Ukraine is Jewish. The problem of the Ukrainian ultra-right must be solved, but it cannot be solved with Russian tanks. The Kremlin’s other charges against Ukraine—about corruption, election manipulation, and dishonest courts—would be far more appropriate for the Kremlin to press against itself. Now, Russian troops are, in the full sense of the word, occupiers in a foreign land—no matter how this contradicts the expectations of everyone who grew up on stories about the Great Patriotic War.
Russia has found itself in international isolation. [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdoğan, [General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party] Xi Jinping, and even the Taliban are asking Putin to stop hostilities. Europe and the United States impose new sanctions against Russia every day.
As we prepare this text, the third day of the war is coming. The Russian army has a clear superiority over the Ukrainian one, but the war does not seem to be going exactly according to Putin’s plan. Apparently, he counted on victory in one or two days with little or no resistance, but there has been serious fighting throughout the territory of Ukraine.
Russians and the whole world are now watching videos showing shells hitting residential buildings, an armored car running over a senior citizen, corpses and shooting.
Roskomnadzor [the Russian government’s Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology, and Mass Media] is still trying to threaten the entire Internet, demanding “Don’t call this a war, but a special operation.” But few people take them seriously anymore. As long as the Internet in Russia is not turned off completely, there will be enough sources of information. Just in case, once again, we recommend setting up Tor with bridges, VPN, and Psiphon in advance.
The effects of the sanctions and the war are just beginning to be felt by Russians: Most of Moscow’s ATMs were out of paper money on Friday. Why? Because the day before, people took 111 billion rubles from banks: in fact, all their savings. The real estate market collapsed, and the construction of residential buildings is the most important branch of the Russian economy. The foreign automotive industry is gradually ceasing to ship cars to Russia. The exchange rates of the dollar and the euro are artificially constrained by the Central Bank. Shares of all Russian companies fell severely. Everyone understands that it will only get worse.
The Russian reaction to the war in Ukraine is completely different from what happened here in 2014 [when Russia seized Crimea after the Ukrainian revolution]. Many people, including celebrities who worked for the government, are demanding an immediate end to the war. The removal of Ivan Urgant, the leading Russian TV star, from the air is noteworthy.
The vast majority of those who still support Putin are also against the war. The average Putin supporter just now thinks that everything has been calculated, the war will not drag on for long, the Russian economy will survive. Because yes, it’s not easy to live with the understanding that your country is ruled by a deranged person—by Don Quixote with a million-strong army, one of the strongest in the world, Don Quixote with a nuclear weapon capable of destroying all of humanity. It is difficult to realize that, having read second-rate political scientists and philosophers, one can bomb a neighboring fraternal country and destroy one’s own economy.
Reveling in unlimited power, Putin has gradually moved away from reality: there are the stories about two-week quarantines for ordinary mortals who need to meet with the Russian president for some reason, and tables of gigantic length at which Putin receives both his ministers and heads of other states.
Putin has always been a politician who balances the interests of security forces and oligarchs. Now the president has stepped out of this role, having gone on an independent voyage through the boundless sea of senility. We are ready to bet a bottle of the best whiskey that in the near future, Mr. President might experience a coup from his own inner circle.
Russia may meet the year 2023 with some other system of power and a different character in the Kremlin. What it will be is unknown. But for now, it is the dusk before dawn.
In the meantime, protests against the war are taking place in Russia. Anarchists participate in them in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kazan, Perm, Irkutsk, Yekaterinburg and other cities. In Russia, it is extremely difficult to organize street protests; this is fraught with administrative and criminal terms, not to mention good old-fashioned police violence. But people are coming out all the same. Thousands have already been detained, but the protests continue. Russia is against this war and against Putin! Come out—when and where you see fit. Team up with friends and like-minded people. Social networks are suggesting Sunday at 4 p.m. as the time for a general protest action. This day and hour is no worse than any other. Download anti-war leaflets for distribution and posting from our website and social networks!
Russian fliers opposing the invasion, reading “You pay for Putin’s war—taxes, closed borders, poverty, service blockages, information vacuum—no war!” and “No to military invasion of Ukraine: peace to the people, war on the rulers.”
Meanwhile, Ukrainian anarchists are joining in the territorial defense of their cities. It is now harder for them than for people in Russia, but this is one and the same defense. This is the defense of freedom against dictatorship, of will against bondage, of normal people against deranged presidents.
To Your Sheep
If Putin suddenly comes to his senses by some miracle, and the war ends one of these days, are we ready to “return to our sheep,” as the French say? It is likely that we will be kicked out of the Council of Europe. Thus, Russians will lose the opportunity to apply to the European Court of Human Rights, and soon the Kremlin will restore the death penalty.
For now, we will return to the news in the spirit of all recent years: right now, the State Duma [a legislative body in the ruling assembly of Russia] is adopting a law according to which a military conscript must himself come to the military enlistment office rather than waiting for a summons. Putin also recently raised the salaries of the police. And the prosecutor’s office, in an appeal, demands to increase the term of an anarchist from Kansk, Nikita Uvarov, convicted in the famous “Minecraft terrorism case,” from five to nine years.
You yourself know what to do with all this.
Freedom for the peoples! Death to empires!
Police escorting an arrestee holding a sign reading “I’m against war.”
Eskobar was the vocalist of a Ukrainian rock band called Bredor. Long ago, in an interview, he said a famous phrase, which became a meme: “Шо то хуйня, шо это хуйня”—a succinct way to articulate something to the effect of, “When you are forced to choose between two options while lacking any alternative whatsoever, .” ↩
Comments Off on In Defence of the Attack on the CGL Drill Site
Feb252022
Anonymous submission to MTL Counter-info
On February 17 the Coastal GasLink drill pad site by the banks of the Wedzin Kwa (morice river) was seriously damaged by an unknown group of courageous individuals. As anarchist individuals living in the North who are supportive of struggles in defence of the land and against ongoing colonization by canada and its corporate interests we declare our support for this action and encourage others to do so.
While we don’t know exactly what happened that night we can study the statements by CGL and the RCMP to read through the bullshit and get some picture. It seems undeniable from the photos that tremendous property damage was done: Vehicles used by the ex-cop ex-military mercenary Forsythe Security were damaged (the so-called poor traumatized “CGL workers”) and machines and trailers were trashed almost certainly by means of commandeered CGL heavy machinery. Other claims by CGL and the pigs are unsupported by their facts and are almost certainly bullshit: “Workers” themselves were clearly not the subject of attack since all damage was limited to vehicles and buildings and ceased as soon as security left the site. The supposed attempt to set a vehicle on fire with a security guard inside is nothing but conjecture and nonsense. In a video interview CGL released with the mercenary involved he made that claim based on the fact that a flare landed in the back of his truck while he attempted to force his way through land defenders back to the drill pad after having been expelled. Hardly seems like an attempt at lighting a vehicle on fire and in the context clearly a defensive act. Throughout the incident it seems clear that force was only used as necessary to scare CGL security into leaving so that the real work of demolishing CGL’s infrastructure of violence could begin. The axe-murderer narrative hardly stands up to their own facts!
Let’s talk for a minute about the RCMP’s claim about officers being led into a trap and injured. They claimed that they were met with projectiles while attempting to dismantle a blockade and that they then charged in the dark through the road block at which point one of them stepped on a spike board. Spike boards are defensive instruments used to stop vehicles from ramming through road blocks. Rather than their “lulled into a trap” spin this sounds like a defensive action in which people tried to stall a likely-violent police response, only used projectiles when it became necessary to defend the blockade and in which the only police injury was self-inflicted by an officer running through the dark into an unknown situation. Given the history of RCMP police violence in the region and their deployment of assault rifles, attack dogs and use of torture against land defenders it seems clear that this “violence” was defensive in nature and protected people from the far more serious violence the RCMP would reasonably be expected to have done to people if they’d reached the drill pad.
What we are left with is this: After years of trespassing and violating consent, after three militarized RCMP raids at the service of CGL, after years of harassment and intimidation of land defenders by CGL’s Forsythe security and after more peaceful methods had failed to stop CGL’s continuing violence against the land and indigenous relationships and laws some unknown individuals struck back with an impressive act of sabotage and destruction against corporate property. There is a very big difference between violence against property and violence against people and life and compared to the violence that CGL and the RCMP have been unleashing this action at the drill pad seems restrained, proportional and commendable.
We see this action as a natural outgrowth of the ongoing resistance against CGL and not in any way unprovoked or unexpected. While we don’t want to make assumptions about who was responsible we think it’s reasonable to believe this was undertaken by people acting in defense of the land and river. That is why we have referred to them as land defenders. May others continue this fight, take action against CGL, canada and on-going colonization where they stand and draw inspiration and courage from this action as we do.
The passion for freedom, as well as the firmness to refuse any attempt to commercialize it, has led us to create this space to host a catalogue of books by different anarchist publishers. Written or translated, edited, and printed autonomously, these publications aim to give a concrete and coherent reference to the analyses, history, struggles, and experiences that have – and continue to – nourish our anarchist projectuality.
Our selection will not be exhaustive but will gradually increase. One will not find every title from the anarchist heritage, as it is not our intention here to create a supermarket of anarchist ideas, theories, or perspectives – not necessarily because we are not interested in all the forms this can take, but because we are in love with the idea, proposal, and practice of subverting the world of authority without delay. The freedom that we stubbornly seek is against any political strategy, suspicious of democratic consensus, and refractory to submission. So, this selection, available to all, carries the explicit intention of proposing, deepening, and refining anarchist practice that aims for social revolt, without mediation, without compromise, without anything to offer to the reform of this world.
At a time when perspectives of social revolution seem frozen in a sea of deliberate confusion, resigned fear, calculated catastrophes, technological colonization, and authoritarian hysteria, we relaunch, even more obstinately, the words in these books about and for struggle, to invite their readers to sail towards new and unknown horizons of freedom, autonomy, solidarity, conflict, joy.
This book distribution offers publications in English, Dutch, and German, available for single orders and for other distributions.
On May 1st, 2022, Convergence des luttes anticapitalistes (CLAC) is calling for a 15th Anti-Capitalist Workers’ Day demonstration. This year, the colonial state has demonstrated once more that it will prioritize capital growth over our lives. In total hypocrisy, our governments speak the words reconciliation and environment while ignoring the sovereign rights of Indigenous peoples and destroying the land with extractivist and discriminatory policies. It is time to revolt!
As time passes, our steroid pumped capitalist system increasingly contributes to the degradation of the climate and ecological conditions that ensure our survival. We are heading for disaster as our governments collude with oil companies, the forestry industry and the mining industry to continue to push through ecocidal projects like the Coastal GasLink pipeline in Wet’suwet’en land, the Fairy Creek cuts and the latest announcements allowing the mining industry to emit even more zinc and nickel particles in so-called Quebec. To defend their right to bring the world to an end, they buy guns, cops and prisons, because they know that people are resisting, have always resisted and will continue to do so. Extractivism goes hand in hand with colonialism and the oppression of Indigenous peoples; both of these systems of oppression are central to the running of the capitalist system that keeps us in a misery that is constantly getting worse.
We have stopped relying on the hypocritical people in power for quite some time, but Trudeau and Legault are working hard to break records. Our governments continue to lash out at the unvaccinated in order to avoid blaming all the paternalistic governments of the last few decades for the unbearable working conditions in education and health care (disproportionately afffecting women). As usual, there is always a lack of money for schools and hospitals, but never for cops and prisons for migrants. On top of that, our governments wash their hands of the violence they inflict by attacking “wokes”, saying that “Quebecers, we’re not that bad.” Among other things, Legault is puting forward transphobic, interphobic (PL-2), and xenophobic (PL-21) bils in addition to refusing to apply Joyce’s Principle and to consider the housing crisis as such. As ecological catastrophe continues to plague the globe, our governments give us shit worlds of unsustainable electric cars that keep people in bondage and contribute to urban sprawl. They send an RCMP military squad to destroy an Indigenous camp so they can build another state and bank funded fucking pipeline ostie, and this at the very time the province is dealing with major flooding.
We have to face the fact that the situation is devastating; however, the world is starting to wake up and more and more people are standing together, standing in solidarity with other communities and building bridges that didn’t exist before. There is more and more talk of environmental racism, for example of the illegal landfill in Kanesatake that endangers the health of people and land. Banners are appearing in occupied Palestine in solidarity with the defenders of the Wet’suwet’en territory. Our movements to abolish capitalism and all systems of oppression continue to grow in strength. We are on the right track.
We no longer have a choice but to refuse this work-based system of death whose primary interest is the enrichment of the bourgeoisie at the cost of our physical and mental health and the infinitely complex millennia-old ecosystems on which we depend.
On May 1st, let us express our rage against capitalism. Let’s stand up against these oppressions, against the destruction, and build a radically different future. Let’s take to the streets, together.
Two years into the COVID-19 pandemic, a popular movement demanding an immediate end to vaccine mandates and other restrictions on daily life has shaken the Canadian state to its core. Its calls have deeply resonated with members of settler-colonial society in which public health measures and other forms of collective solidarity are seen by some as an affront to individual freedom and an undue hindrance on capitalist enterprise. While the movement is now facing the brunt of a massive wave of state repression, from which it is unlikely to recover, the contradictions it has exposed are only set to get worse.
What appears to be a highly effective act of sabotage carried out by Indigenous land defenders: cue the conspiracy theorists…
And some aren’t even theorizing, they assert it as fact: it was the cops, it was CGL… Here’s a theory: the attack was carried out by Indigenous people who, in the cold dead of night, set out on a mission to sabotage the CGL pipeline.
They carried out an audacious and complex attack that I would imagine started with getting the security guards away from vehicles and buildings. At some point after the security guards had fled, blockades and counter-vehicle devices were put in place on the only road leading to the site, delaying police response probably by hours. In that time the warriors carried out millions of dollars in sabotage.
Considering all this, I think it’s important to acknowledge that this may just be what it appears to be: an attack carried out by Indigenous warriors.
I’ve seen people posting about a bomb attack the RCMP carried out in Alberta in the 1990s as proof of cops carrying out fake attacks. This bombing was part of the police investigation of Wiebo Ludwig and his campaign against the oil and gas industry. The action was intended to entrap Ludwig. With cooperation from the oil company, the police blew up an abandoned, unused shed. It was in no way a major act of sabotage, in contrast to what is now being reported in Wet’suwet’en territory. It was insignificant compared to the actual sabotage that was occurring and for which Ludwig was widely suspected… and for which there was a virtual media blackout by the oil companies and RCMP who did not want the practice of sabotage to spread.
One of the problems with this conspiracy mongering is that is undermines the effectiveness of this action. The more it spreads and festers the more people question if it was a genuine act of resistance or not. Who does this inspire? In whose interests are acts of Indigenous resistance diminished rather than promoted? I also believe this conspiracy mongering demoralizes those who carried out the action (and who are now being hunted by police).
